1. Technical Field
Embodiments of the invention relate generally to multi-core processors, and more particularly, to a method for optimizing the voltage-frequency parameters in multi-core processor systems.
2. Description of Related Art
Multi-core processor systems enable substantial performance increase without requiring a huge increase in processing speeds. Notably, multi-core processor systems enable parallel processing in computer programs.
While systems that use multi-core processors may work well for parallel computer programs, the degree of improvement of multi-core processor systems on legacy sequential computer programs is unclear. The main reason is the difficulties encountered in parallelizing computer programs using existing compiler technologies. One workaround approach is to keep the sequential computer programs unmodified and leverage on multiple processor-cores to speed up the computer programs transparently using only hardware mechanisms. This approach often relies on running the computer programs on two coupled processor-cores, where one processor-core is used to speed up the execution of the computer program on the other processor-core.
Even with this workaround approach, multi-core processors still suffer from a certain degree of performance loss as chip manufacturers typically specify conservative values for processor frequencies in order to guarantee accuracy of results during execution. In addition, the problem of within-die variation, which previously affects single core-based processors, is also observed to be manifesting on the per-processor-core level, thus affecting performance.